Flayed Skull>Poisoned tongue for splinter spam

Flayed skull is re roll 1's to wound for rapid fire weapons that are flying

Poisoned tongue is re roll 1's to wound.

So already flayed skull is statistically better, because we hit more often than we wound, and hitting comes first in the sequence of rolls.

THEN you factor in splinter racks, which are 2 hits if you roll a six, another reason to prefer re rolls to hit over wound.

PLUS flayed skull gets ignore cover and +3" move

The only disadvantage is you get none of this when your transport goes down, and your kabalites don't get the re rolls in melee (really more for courts honestly)

but even then, the game is designed so you'd rather be stronger earlier on than later off. At the beginning when we have boats, we want to be better in them rather than when they are broken and we are hiding in a ditch.

While I'll also agree with the sentiment of Flayed skull is overall better than Poisoned Tongue, I still like the concept of poisoned tongue simply for anyone who is crazy enough to still try and send kabalites into melee. Is it a good option? Probably not. But hey, if that's the route you want to go they let you try just a little better.

Plus as some people are pointing out, it's better for units like Sslyths who have a poisoned weapon that isn't rapid fire (shard carbine) as well as being more geared towards melee. So hey, it's something.

And when you hit on 2+ thanks to the Stratagem, you will get more hits hit than you had shots. Pretty neat indeed.

Stratagem only works against units with the fly keyword, which often have a negative to hit penalty so I don't think hitting on +2 will be that common.

Also one thing I'm not sure about for flayed skull, does the reroll 1s ability only work for our infantry when embarked on transports? That was my read of the rule, which if it is the case makes poisoned tongue a bit more enticing since the reroll works all the time. Granted I think I still like flayed skull more, but that's a point in favor of poisoned tongue.

Keep in mind we don't know what the poisoned tongue stratagem is yet, it could be better than the flayed skull one so can't say that's a point in favor of the flayed skull just yet.

A fair point, however, consider the Craftworld's codex.

Alaitoc gives a great trait (-1 to hit outside 12") and a meh Strategem (6+ to hit against a unit of Rangers, that's probably at -2 already.)

Compare that to Saim-Hann's trait (Reroll failed charges, move and shoot heavy weapons with bikes) which is okay and their Strategem (Advance and Charge with bikes, plus Reroll 1's to hit in the ensuing fight phase), which is amazing.

Alaitoc dominates the meta with things like Shining Spears preferring that hit modifier over a Strategem and trait tailored specifically to them. Hell, I know I do.

Specific Strategems are great, don't get me wrong, but they won't make up for a mediocre trait.

Stratagem only works against units with the fly keyword, which often have a negative to hit penalty so I don't think hitting on +2 will be that common.

Also one thing I'm not sure about for flayed skull, does the reroll 1s ability only work for our infantry when embarked on transports? That was my read of the rule, which if it is the case makes poisoned tongue a bit more enticing since the reroll works all the time. Granted I think I still like flayed skull more, but that's a point in favor of poisoned tongue.

That's mostly for planes.

Anti grav, monsters, Jump packs, bikes... there will be a TON of opportunities to hit on 2+. And with splinter weaponry, you'll have the sweet "racks procing on 5+" against flying monsters, jump packs and bikes. Which is VERY nice.

Mechanically reroll 1 to hit is identically useful to reroll 1 to wound regardless of the hit or wound rate. The only time they are different is when you have something special on a roll of 6+ for example.

The reason for that is if you are rerolling 1s your total hit or wound rate will be:[total hit/wound rate] = [base hit/wound rate] + 1/6 × [base hit/wound rate]which can be rearranged as:= [base hit/wound rate] × (1 + 1/6)So regardless of what your base rate is you improve your final rate by 1/6. And as the total damage is generally attacks × hit rate × wound rate × unsaved rate, gaining the same multiplier to hit rate or wound rate gives the same total increase.

Once you get a bonus for a 6 to hit or 6 to wound then you have a reason for wanting rerolls of that type.

On paper Flayed Skull looks better than Poisoned Tongue, but if the transport is destroyed the Flayed Skull bonus is lost, and doesn't extend into melee. The two seem fairly closely balanced with each other to me.

Poison tongue strikes me as a more "middle of the road" or "jack of all trades" type deal. If you intend your Kabalites to see most of their action outside of transports, better to go with Poisoned Tongue. If you run what most DE lists look like now, with Kabs staying in Venoms until they get shot too much, you're better off with Flayed Skull.

In addition, Poisoned Tongue is gonna be great for assaulty units. If you have/plan to run any Kabal melee, that's the way to go.

Regarding the math, you were right, but for the wrong reasons

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I'm posting some math here;Assume you have 9 Kabalite warriors with splinter rifles in a raider within 12 inches of a living unit (the 10th can have a blaster or something else that you ignore). Also assume there is no -1 to hit because that would stuff up the 2 hits on a 6+ to hit splinter rack bonus.

So the bonuses are the same for both gangs as long as the transport isn't destroyed.

Finally, assuming that you were taking the raider anyway (a massive assumption) the extra wounds inflicted by this unit is equivalent to about 10 points of kabalite warriors, or an extra 1.5 models per each 9 man squad for each gang and about 15 points, or 2 kabalite warriors per 9 man squad for the splinter rack. I assume that a splinter cannon would further increase the effectiveness of the splinter rack, but -1 to hit and the raider dying would decrease the effectiveness.

This means that taking 4 kabalite raider gunboats would net you around ~40 points, which is good but isn't a must take bonus.

I second this math. Flayed Skull and Poisoned Tongue will get the same average number of wounds with their Splinter rifles, with or without Splinter racks.

That will surprise some people, but...Flayed Skull increases the number of hits by a factor of 7/6 (including those from Splinter racks)Poisoned Tongue increases the number of wounds by a factor of 7/6 (including those from Splinter racks)Therefore - the end result is the same at the wounds stage.

Flayed Skull still gets the benefit of ignoring cover, including for the Blaster, but Poisoned Tongue isn't vulnerable to losing the transport and gets a boost in melee too. Nicely balanced boosts between the two options.

Both can be combined. Put a poisoned tongue unit in a flayed skull raider, you'll get both rules.

Partly.The increased raider speed helps the unit of course.But the unit needs to be flayed skull too to get the "Re-roll Rapid fire 1s to hit" and the "Ignore cover" part of the Slay from the Skies Obsession.If i read it correctly."...Attacks made by models with this Obsession..."